Memorial Day is marked each year with parades, picnics, TV specials, and the first 3-day weekend in 3 months. There are mattress sales and blow-out specials on new cars, and it marks the beginning of summer fun in most of the country. Why do we treat the deaths of over a million service men and women in our country’s history as a celebration? Has the meaning of Memorial Day been lost? Have we become numb to the horrible cost of war and just consider it the “price of freedom?” We’ll explore the motivation for remembering and honoring those whose lives were taken in the wars of our past from the perspective of a veteran.

Larry is retired from the high-tech world where he worked with start-up companies to develop products, business models, and strategies for investors. He has been a UU since his college days in the 1970s, involved in many areas: committee on ministry, strategic planning, board member trainer, speaker, men’s group, and social justice in UU fellowships in Kirkland, Bellevue, Whidbey Island, and Port Townsend. A veteran of both the Army and the Navy, he supports the people in uniform while also working to hold the military accountable to local communities, and helps organize action around issues of community-military concern. Elected to the QUUF Board in June 2021, he became president in July 2021.

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Click here to read the reading and sermon.